AN ALLEGED DERELICTION of duty by a senior teacher at Alexandra School was only realized by Chief Education Officer Laurie King six months after a letter of complaint was written to him about the matter.
With no record of the letter having ever reached the Ministry of Education, King yesterday told a commission of inquiry before Justice Frederick Waterman that he only saw the mysterious letter on January 9 this year after he had heard about the teacher in the media weeks before and had asked Alexandra principal Jeff Broomes for a report.
Giving evidence on the second day of the inquiry at the Garfield Sobers Complex, King recalled that after hearing about Broomes’ December 2, 2011 awards ceremony speech in which he publicly criticized the senior teacher for abandoning her class for an entire term, he requested a report from Broomes on January 6.
Three days later, King got the report along with two letters from Broomes, one dated June 4, 2011, addressed to him and the other dated May 24, 2011, to the head of Alexandra’s science department Amaida Greaves. According to King, his ministry had no record of these letters being received via the receptionist or his secretary.
